Free Thinking

Add your comment to this debate

Please add your comments to the debate 'Is the world really shrinking?'
Did you change your position on this subject because you heard a new point of view?

A selection of comments will be published here.

Ren Reynolds
I believe your debate was based on a fallacy know as Technological Determinism, that is, what technology does is make shifts in human relations, often these shifts are changes in power relations, an example on the program was how we might be expected to respond to emails even when we are not at work, the opposite of this might be how much more special a hand written letter now feels to us. Famously Melvin C. Kranzberg said "technology is [actually] neither good, nor bad, nor is it neutral." What is the determining factor is the assumptions that we make about technology as it is developed and becomes integrated into society. The assumed neutrality, for example, of system that may well contain errors or encoded bias is made all the worse by de-empowering and de-skilling those that work with technology, as not only is it assumed to be neutral but more economically efficient. It is us that put people in charge or us that take charge. Technology may be used as a facilitator, even an excuse, but it is the people that end up with power or the potential for power hat need to be examined.

peter jones
Yes it is and as a result we need an antidote: a balance of analysis and synthesis - using a universal conceptual framework - (google) Hodges model!

Jason Davies
We buy the gadgets to buy into a lifestyle that's been carefully marketed by big corporations. It's techno fashion. We must have that iPod and a camera on our mobile phone, mainly because we don't want to feel excluded. Demand for fashionable technology is what drives development.